Brakie, when you say "T-6", are you referring to the MRC TECH 6 (2.0 or 6.0) that is switchable from DC to DCC? If so, have you, by chance, ever checked the AC voltage at the track (no load) on the DCC mode? I have a 6.0 and a 2.0 T-6, and when one began to act a little "irratic" on DCC, I decided to check the AC voltage at the track. To my astonishment, the voltage on BOTH was over 25 volts AC! I used three different meters, two digital, one analog. All reading 25 to 27 volts on the 200v ac scale. One meter, which had a 20volt scale, read only 14 volts on that scale, but on the 200v scale, they all read 25+ volts AC! If you have a digital meter that reads AC, I would really be curious as to what YOU'RE getting! The folks at MRC say it should NEVER exceed 16 volts! Just curious....
Mike C.
Sound it depends on when I am operating. Yes in the daytime no at midnight. Be glad the sound isn’t as loud as 1:1 railroads I want to stay married!
Sometimes it nice to sil the layout and put music on.
Joe Staten Island West
joe323 Sound it depends on when I am operating. Yes in the daytime no at midnight. Be glad the sound isn’t as loud as 1:1 railroads I want to stay married!
Wife threatened me about sound locos. I open the windows as a compromise, so we're both unhappy.
I have the wrong sounds.
She gets to listen to 12" to the foot scale SD70s.
-Dan
Builder of Bowser steam! Railimages Site
NeO6874 joe323 Sound it depends on when I am operating. Yes in the daytime no at midnight. Be glad the sound isn’t as loud as 1:1 railroads I want to stay married! Wife threatened me about sound locos. I open the windows as a compromise, so we're both unhappy. I have the wrong sounds. She gets to listen to 12" to the foot scale SD70s.
Actually If I open the window I could hear the Staten Island Railway go by about a block away .
A train is a train
I'm not far enough along on my layout for sound yet. I'm still working on sight I'll get there one day. From the ones I've heard at the club, I like it
ATLANTIC CENTRAL A few basic facts about audiology and sound reproduction. FACT - listening to inaccurate, low fidelity sound will create irritablity in most people after a while. The degree of irriatation, and the time frame are highly variable, but in general the longer you listen to low quailty sound, and the louder it is , the sooner you will be bothered by it. FACT - listening to a low quality reproduction of pleasing sounds you are familiar with will trigger more detailed memories of those sounds stored in your brain. This can and will partly offset the negative effects of low quality sound outlined above. FACT - sounds are much different outdoors, some sounds travel more, some sounds dissipate more quickly. Standing track side, at let's say 150', locomotive sounds come and go quickly as the loco passes by. Rolling stock track noise quickly drowns it out. Track noise can often be heard much farther away, and for longer than loco noise. So, if you are seeking that intimate, one on one experiance with your train, as in being the engineer, than you probably like sound. If you are more of a big picture, multiple trains moving, kind of guy, you are likely to be less interested in the noise from onboard sound. We all choose based on our personal levels of comfort with these conflicting facts. Sheldon
A few basic facts about audiology and sound reproduction.
FACT - listening to inaccurate, low fidelity sound will create irritablity in most people after a while. The degree of irriatation, and the time frame are highly variable, but in general the longer you listen to low quailty sound, and the louder it is , the sooner you will be bothered by it.
FACT - listening to a low quality reproduction of pleasing sounds you are familiar with will trigger more detailed memories of those sounds stored in your brain. This can and will partly offset the negative effects of low quality sound outlined above.
FACT - sounds are much different outdoors, some sounds travel more, some sounds dissipate more quickly.
Standing track side, at let's say 150', locomotive sounds come and go quickly as the loco passes by. Rolling stock track noise quickly drowns it out. Track noise can often be heard much farther away, and for longer than loco noise.
So, if you are seeking that intimate, one on one experiance with your train, as in being the engineer, than you probably like sound.
If you are more of a big picture, multiple trains moving, kind of guy, you are likely to be less interested in the noise from onboard sound.
We all choose based on our personal levels of comfort with these conflicting facts.
Sheldon
A few thoughts:
I moved a few years ago to a location that is reasonably near a class 1 mainline. Probably 1/2 a mile away The blowing horns are loud enough near my home, but not too loud. Shortly after moving, they were a concern, but I quickly got used to them and the other train noises to where they become a part of the routine ambient noises (which reminds me of a scene in The Blues Brothers, but nevermind).
Since train noises are now part of routine sounds, my ear detects the sound of the train long before any type of horn blows. Its not a mechanical sound. It could be a deep rumble vibration. It could also be the sound waves of everything (exhaust, motors, and wheel clang) meshing together from such a far distance. As it gets louder, I can almost predict when the horn will blow. Only when I am at the crossing do I hear the loco and the wheel clang....the individual sounds. From far away, they all seem to mesh together into a deep bass tone.
Another item. I was visiting a train shop in a former depot, in a town that had a train-horn ordinance....no horn blowing in certain locations. As I was leaving, I noticed the train noise as I approached the door, and was quite surprised to notice I was in the middle of a long unit coal train. Since no horn was blown, the passing string of cruising locos sailed by the depot in near silence.
Two items to think about when determining what sounds a model train should make to represent realism. If that's a goal.
- Douglas
J.S. You are probably very familiar with the hobby shop in West Columbia, been shopping there for over thirty years. I have built 4 nice layouts with equipment from West Columbia.. Know Yamasee well, practised in Fairfax for twenty years then moved on. Ed Newman, of NBC's Today Show was from Yamasee, SC. It is a great train watching town, Amtrak even stops there I do believe.
That hobby shop in West Columbia even had some box cars made of the Newberry-Columbia Line, two run on my pike.
For those of you who aren't familiar with Yamasee, SC, don't close your eyes or you'll slip right through. It's the kind of town where you fell in love with a local girl, could stand on the train platform at sunset and hear the moan of a muffled steam whistle, and hear your mother calling when it was time for dinner. That time is gone, but you can still stand on that train platform and you may just hear that whistle.
Robert Sylvester
Newberry-Columbia Line, SC
The Palmetto stops in Yemasee, long enough for you to block traffic on three different streets and get a ton of dirty looks!